First Love

Chapter Two

The following Monday morning Nora was caught daydreaming by her two employees, Neil and Kristen while opening her store. Nora owns a bridal gown store called Giselle's Bridal located only ten minutes from her cozy new one-bedroom apartment in New Jersey. Nora designed every single wedding dress that hangs in her store. Ever since Nora was a little girl, she would dream of being a bride one day. She wanted everyone to fall in love with her in her wedding dress like she'd seen at many of her cousin's weddings. Nora started drawing sketches of different types of wedding dresses when she was twelve years old in hopes to create the most perfect wedding dress for her own wedding.

Nora's mother wanted her to become the world's best ballroom dancer, but life took another turn for Nora once she graduated high school. In college, Nora studied Fashion Designs and minored in business and dance. After graduating from college Nora realized that the fashion industry was a hard business to get into so she stuck to what she knew best and that was dancing. She landed a job teaching ballroom dance at a dance company in Jersey City. Since Nora couldn't land a job in the fashion industry, she made the fashion industry come to her. She started designing and making her own wedding dresses just by using her old sewing machine that her grandmother gave her. After being with the dance company for two years and making her own dresses on the side in that time, Nora decided to open up her own bridal gown store where her designs can be seen and sold. Ever since she took that initiative, she's never been happier.

"Thinking about him, are we?" Neil said, while holding a piece of fabric in his hands.

Nora snapped out of her daydream and smiled at Neil as he busied himself around the store looking back at her. "Him ho?"

"The one who's got you drooling and gazing into la-la land." Neil smiled.

Kristen, who was standing behind the counter at the register added, "So who is he?"

Nora smiled and glanced at the two of them as they waited for her to spill the beans. She rolled her eyes and said, "Okay fine."

Both Kristen and Neil rushed and huddled around Nora while she pulled up a chair across the linoleum floor. "There's not much to tell. I met this guy, at Mel's engagement party on Saturday..."

"Does this guy have a name?" Neil asked.

"Matt." Nora revealed.

"And?" Kristin cut in.

"That's it, we had a drink, we danced and he gave me his number."

"If there's nothing to tell, then why does he have you in gaga land?" Neil chimed in.

Nora took a deep breath in then out and said, "I don't know. Maybe it's the way we danced together, I don't know. He was a bit arrogant, but still charming at the same time. He had these beautiful brown eyes that wouldn't stop staring at me." A smile formed on the side of her mouth. "There was something so mysterious about him."

Neil smiled back at Nora and shook his head. "I'd say he put a spell on you girl."

"Yup." Kristen agreed. "And I say you give this man a call before he put a spell on some other woman."

Nora couldn't believe she had just spoken those words about Matt, about a man she doesn't even know. It's not her fault that he's given her reasons to talk so kindly of him. She just couldn't resist.

"I can't think about that right now, we've got a lot of work to do today." Nora got up from the chair and began pushing it back in its place while Neil and Kristin got back to their duties.

For lunch, Nora picked up a ham sandwich and a fruit smoothie from the little deli around the corner. Since she missed breakfast, she also added a container of strawberries and a bag of potato chips to her meal. Since Matt's been on her mind all morning, Nora thought it was a perfect time to give him a call. Usually Nora eats out for lunch, but she brought her lunch back to the privacy of her office in the back of the store. Nora reached into her purse and pulled out Matt's business card which read, Roman Realty with his name, number and email address underneath.